


A Bad Feeling

by BritaniaVance



Series: Atonement [1]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Legends: Knights of the Old Republic, Star Wars Legends: Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords
Genre: Angst, Cantina, Character Study, Drinking, F/M, Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-11
Updated: 2015-04-11
Packaged: 2018-03-22 08:06:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,698
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3721444
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BritaniaVance/pseuds/BritaniaVance
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After a fight with Kreia, Eden invites Atton out for a drink while they're stranded on Citadel Station to get a feel for his intentions and is undoubtedly surprised by what truth she finds.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Bad Feeling

The sheer heat of inebriated egos and a near blinding kaleidoscope of lights greeted them upon entering Citadel Station’s only cantina. Atton had never seen anything quite like it before, and Atton had seen quite a bit of everything. Yet the scoundrel was met with more foreign things than he was used to with every turn since Peragus – the ex-Jedi beside him being one of them.

Standing before the brink of the crowd, Atton eyed Eden, whose own eyes were fixated on somewhere indistinguishable in the depths of the room. An uncertain expression stood its ground over her features, clouded in doubt and a furrowed brow.

Atton felt his arm nudge her to garner her attention. He found his limbs did that now, reacted without his express permission, and they always wanted to reach out to Eden, to feel her skin against his, to take in the heat of her. She turned to face him, her brows still knotted in a state of discontent.

“You okay?” he asked at full volume. His words were swallowed by the chaos of the crowd, but Eden was able to either read his lips or use sorcery to translate his meaning.

Eden _tsked_ before responding, “ _Of course I’m fine_ ,” only Eden leaned into him to speak, knowing the volume to be overpowering. Her lips brushed against his ear as she spoke. The mere sensation sent unfamiliar tremors through him, and Atton knew he was in a whole load of trouble.

He wondered if this were the best idea, if Eden were somehow trying to compensate for something lost in the aftermath of her argument with Kreia prior to their coming here, of all places. Atton was surprised when she invited him out. Had he time to better imagine the scenario, the Exile would not have been so curt about it all and might have wanted to share a drink for reasons having less to do with drowning her frustration with the ancient crone back at the apartment and might instead have more to do with getting to know him better in the little time they had left.

Atton sighed disconcerted with how strange it all felt. Despite his familiarity with the cantina scene, this one seemed  _different_ , and somehow more desperate. Eden appeared nonplussed, though bored if anything. She began shouldering through the dance floor, making her way to the bar without so much as asking Atton to follow. Before losing sight of her, he followed suit, keeping an eye on the back of her braided head and watching how the beads in her hair caught the myriad of lights flashing above them.

There was something unsettling about this particular cantina that set Atton’s senses off-kilter as he sidled past the young dancers swarming the floor. The Red Sector seethed with scum, but much unlike Nar Shaddaa, this crowd was particularly young, particularly innocent. Anonymous hands grasped at his, sweaty pleas for a partner’s touch inspired by a desperation that was only found at the bottom of a cup or several. These club-goers were eager for a ticket off this station and were prepared, or so they thought, to do whatever it took to get it, unaware of what waited for them in the darker corners of the galaxy.

Atton spotted his ex-Jedi companion not too far away, shooting him a somewhat impatient glare. She stood still in the massive, moving mob, peering over her shoulder to make sure that Atton was still following. He nodded, and wondered what the Exile thought about all this, what she knew of the galaxy’s desperation disguised as hopeful youth…

Once clear of the dance floor, Eden slid onto a stool at the bar. The counter illuminated her face with a ghostly glow, lit by some off-world fluorescent stuff often found in cantina décor. Despite himself, Atton suddenly imagined meeting Eden here by happenstance as he assumed the seat beside her… he would be cocky, most likely, with a pocketful of Pazaak winnings, a handful of which he would fan out on the bar for onlooking patrons to notice. He would order a drink for the two of them to get to know one another over before even telling her his name.

The Exile’s green eyes, now an unearthly azure in the light, surveyed him with a raised brow - and it was then that he knew she would most likely respond to such imaginary advances with a hard, right hook before he even knew what hit him.

He smiled in spite of the thought and raised his hand to garner the bartender’s attention. The man pointedly ignored him and asked Eden what she would be having instead, even though she made no motion to order. Atton lowered his hand to rest on the counter, his fingers rapping on its surface as he watched Eden gesture without words. The Twi’lek disappeared beneath the shelves and returned with twin crystal cups filled with a mysterious clear liquid. In all his time spent at bars, Atton had only ever seen fluorescent liquor, glittering and pretty. Even juma was the hue of most moons. It was now Atton’s turn to consider Eden with a raised brow. Without explanation, she slid a cup in his direction as a wry smile spirited over her lips.

“I knew you were going to order us a round of juma, _the gentleman that you are_ , but you were wondering about my time on the Outer Rim so I thought I’d show you rather than tell you.”

Atton looked from the drink to the poker face that quelled Eden’s smirk.

“You’re not trying to kill me, are you? I hear most things on the Outer Rim kill you.”

“ _Most_ things, yes,” she said, bringing the miniscule container to her lips, poised at the ready.

Atton followed suit, his nostrils already searing with the smell of the stuff.

Eden’s eyes locked with his before she nodded at him, that same smile teasing the corners of her mouth upward, and before Atton could succumb to her expressions again, he did the same.

“Wow, you have-” Atton swallowed what tasted very much like poison, “ _refined_ taste.”

It took more physical discipline than anticipated to mask his face from revealing his inner agony. The alcohol slithered like molten lead down his throat.

Atton glanced sideways at Eden as he downed the rest of his cup, using her as a distraction from the burning aftertaste. Her glass was already empty and all that was left on her lips was a wide, wicked grin.

“What?” he asked innocently as a shadow of a grimace betrayed his features.

Eden’s grin remained and Atton felt his skin crawl with more than just the after-effects of alcohol. It was a phenomenon that occurred more often than he’d like since leaving what remained of Peragus behind. Eden’s eyes would light up or she would snap and say something utterly bitter and biting and _funny,_ and Atton could not help himself from taking notice, from admiring the way her freckled nose wrinkled in disgust or how she would roll her eyes and pout her lips when she was impatient, folding her toned arms and tapping a foot with tempered aggravation.

“Nothing,” she replied, biting back her smile.

“Y’know,” he began, his fingers rapping on his glass with every syllable he spoke, “If this is your idea of showing versus telling, I think I prefer the telling part, none of this deadly teasing.” Atton emphasized his final words with a brandishing of his empty cup, not for a refill but more out of amazement that the stuff hadn’t burned a hole in the glass like acid.

And by teasing Atton really meant: getting suspiciously quiet and changing the subject _._ Not that Atton was one to talk, of course, having hardly spoken of his life before they met, either. _Not that it matters, right?_ Though to be fair, Eden never asked. She was the one who brought up fragments of her own past without further explanation. Atton had no true shred of evidence, but he had a feeling this habit had something to do with the Exile being a little too used to exile and not used to human interaction enough to make up for it. Her secret smiles made up for her shortcomings though; they made up for everything. Atton was slowly beginning to hate himself for actively looking for them, inspiring them with snide remarks and bad jokes.

Eden’s face relaxed, contemplating the empty contents of her cup. 

“I’ll try to play fair,” she responded, her face unreadable. “This _lovely_ tonic is a common drink among mercs in the Rim, for starters. Specialty of Anchorhead. It’s made from some fermented perennial flower, one of the very few things that even grows on that rock. Despite the planet’s moisture farming, this stuff is always in demand.”

“Anchorhead, huh?” he asked as the unengaged portion of his mind filtered through what he knew of Tatooine to fuel the conversation. There had been a skirmish there before the war, a few settlements desolated, but that was nothing new for such a rough and tumble planet. All his brain seemed capable of retrieving was, “What was it that enticed you? The ocean view or the temperate weather?”

He mentally shook his head, berating his inner dialogue for failing to be anything but flirtatious and disingenuous, the scum that he was.

“A bad feeling,” she replied, looking over her empty cup at him. Even though Atton tried to keep his mind preoccupied from doing anything _stupid_ , he knew Eden was trying to read him. Maybe she was still new to this, but he could tell she wasn’t using any mind tricks. She wasn’t sending telepathic tendrils of the Force into Atton’s mind to do her bidding. Instead, she did this the old fashioned way with her eyes scanning his face for signs of trustworthiness, examining what she already knew of him, weighing it against her better judgment... like any other spacer might.

“So far you’ve proven to be an awful storyteller,” Atton joked, again searching to bring her expression out of whatever inward darkness to which it had crept, “Far too many cliffhangers. You’ll lose an audience with that sort of material, and, _Force_ think of the ratings?!”

And there it was; a ghost of a smile at his words and whatever haunted the woman beside him melted away. Eden softened at Atton’s antics this time, and for more than a few seconds. Maybe that old witch really was cramping his style.

“I know, I said I’d play fair,” she laughed lightly, motioning for another two drinks. Eden slid her cup forward for the bartender’s taking. Atton mirrored her, admiring how gracefully she did everything. Despite how sloppy her command of the Force was at times, Atton had never seen a human being with so much physical control before. Everything Eden did from dodging an attack to opening a door seemed like a dance to him. Every action was effortless. And perhaps Atton was paying closer attention than he ought to have, as usual…

“You know, I’m quite familiar with bad feelings myself,” Atton coaxed Eden’s silence. Atton’s elbow, resting on the bar, felt the ever-present pull towards her. He moved, though barely, stopping himself despite the desire to make contact.

Watching her contemplate her next words, Atton knew he would not have liked the imaginary meeting he had conjured in those moments approaching the bar. Perhaps such a meeting would have felt commonplace before what happened at Peragus, it might have been the norm… but being in Eden’s presence was anything but that. Despite what new, unexplored territories of emotion begged his attention when he was around her, Atton felt that he was more critically aware of everything around him, of everything that happened. Had he found himself here a month ago, would he have cared about those anonymous hands reaching for him? Probably not, and carrying that thought felt a lot like guilt as he watched Eden struggling to segue into conversation.

“I know,” she replied as the bartender returned with their drinks. The Twi’lek slid another cool cup into Atton’s open palm.

“I _know_ ,” Eden repeated, as if reminding herself, “You've shown an unprecedented talent for knowing when we’re in deep shit.”

Atton laughed, though felt something deeper at her words despite her latent crudeness. “I do, don’t I?” Maybe it was the recognition, maybe it was the lack of sarcasm in her voice, maybe…

“I’m not attempting to hazard a guess at the hows and whys, but it’s the only time I’m sure you’re being honest. If only I had you at Anchorhead,” Eden finished, her voice genuine, reflective and almost wistful. Atton looked up at her, her eyes sincerely focused on his. “Shall we?”

He feared the next drink. Yet, aiming to save face, he raised his cup at Eden as she did the same.

Atton shook his head upon swallowing all in one swig, and could feel his bones turn to clay. His balance on the stool felt too uncertain for comfort. Maybe juma got its draw from the sheer amount of sugar in its contents, which Atton never took note of until he thoroughly examined the sterile aftertaste of Eden’s dare drink. He glanced sideways at the Exile’s smiling lips. _This is stronger than I thought_. Two drinks down and Atton was already slipping into a self he desperately wished Eden would never see, and it bothered him to no end that he would mind so much...

“So what exactly happened at Anchorhead that could have benefited from my assistance?” Atton asked, his lips already feeling the first sensations of numbness. _Shit_ …

“My last misadventure, to be _exact_ ,” Eden mused, mirroring his words, “Not counting this one, of course.”

“Your optimism is inspiring, really,” Atton quipped before he could stop himself. Eden laughed before resuming.

“Eight years wandering and you never stop hearing Revan’s name.” Eden sighed, “She’s everywhere. _Trust me_ … that is, if you already don’t.”

“Oh, I trust you,” he replied, meaning it more earnestly than Eden may have expected.

“I ended up in Anchorhead because there was promise of steady work… and I know what you’re thinking: Tatooine is the _last_ place in the ‘verse to find steady work of any kind. Even assassins have a hard time in those parts.”

 _‘Assassins_ ’ echoed in his mind, a poisoned hiss tempting to maim his ego but Eden’s alcohol of choice provided the inebriated barrier required to ignore such internal scorn, no matter how deep-seated. But the word teased him nonetheless, always reluctant to leave him be.

Eden found what she said next funny before she even said it, “Droid repairs, your favorite. It was the only thing I acquired from the war that carried no bad memories – aside from a scorched motherboard. Nothing that might have needed a drink to cope with. That is, until I overheard of an expedition…”

“I take it this expedition was of the ‘ _doomed_ _from the start_ ’ variety?”

“I see you’re familiar with the sort,” she smiled wryly at him. Eden had never said it outright, but she had so far guessed correctly at his unsavory smuggling past and Atton hoped to long dead gods that that was the extent of her deductive reasoning. “And for all the wrong reasons, I’d imagine.”

Atton made no motion to correct her. He instead laughed bitterly as he watched his fingers continue to tap at his glass. As he counted imaginary couplings, his hand turned the crystal to catch the light, watching its many reflections dance across the metal fastenings of the counter. He could feel Eden watching him, soaking in her story before she continued.

“I’ll let your innards sterilize a moment before ordering another round, Force knows you need it.”

Atton sensed a smile to her words, but he could not bring himself to face her. His eyes remained fixed on the miniature light show he was now orchestrating on the counter, sensing the bartender growing irritable with his choice of venue. He didn’t know which was worse, Eden’s impression of him or her accuracy regarding the matter… or the fact that he cared at all.

Eden must have sensed his unease and nudged him with her elbow. Given the nature of their drinks, Atton’s gaze was drawn to their point of contact, momentarily afraid his limbs were acting of their own accord again but was drawn up to Eden’s earnest face when he registered that _she_ had initiated the movement and that her arm was still lingering against his on the bar. The ghostly light of the counter illuminated her face, her skin glowing beneath a constellation of freckles, and that was when he noticed it for the first time: a long, jagged scar across her cheek, like a raw belt of space dust striped across the stars. He stopped counting, though his fingers still twitched, as he imagined the pad of his thumb traveling over the scar’s ridge, caressing her cheek, marveling at what skin had healed over despite what other battle scars she wore like armor. _Shiiiit_ …

“Aw, come on,” Eden pleaded, her voice mingled with mirth and concern. Her elbow prodded his again and Atton realized his innards needed more sterilizing than Eden knew.

“You might want to give it a moment,” she said, though Atton only narrowed his eyes at her, unsure of her intent. “This isn’t your run of the mill juma. Just wait a moment, and… you’ll know what I mean.”

So Eden was choosing to mistake his apprehension for fear that he was not drunk enough to hear her tale. Either her impression of him was far worse than anticipated or this girl really had a hard time holding an audience.

Atton inhaled deeply, feeling the sharp unease of alcohol lacing his throat. His lungs were warm, coated in a thin layer of fire that lingered after stronger drinks, and he immediately knew what Eden spoke of. Perhaps the warmth he felt wasn’t from Eden’s touch at all, but from the destructive nature of whatever she had convinced him to drink.

Eden finally retracted her arm and spun around to face the dancing mass, her elbows now resting on the bar behind her. The glow from the counter illuminated the beads in her braided hair, lighting it up like a circuit board. Her fingers rapped on the edge of the bar, though Atton had no inclination as to whether there was a method to her tapping or if that was just him.      

“You already know I was exiled, no longer a Jedi, right?” she asked almost too quickly, not wishing to linger on the subject.

Atton nodded.

“And that I had no command of the Force whatsoever?”

“I gathered that much, given your performance on Peragus,” he said, a smile gracing his mouth as he spoke, still feeling numb and not entirely his own.

Eden glanced at his remark, her eyes suspiciously considering his smirk, but she continued without comment.

“Well, it’s no wonder I tried to avoid all Jedi _bullshit_ once I left, but I don’t know… there was something about Anchorhead that didn’t sit well with me.” Eden was now watching the lights overhead, her eyes lit up like twin galaxies spinning in miniature, swimming with countless glittering reflections.

“I’m assuming this has something to do with your ominous bad feeling?” Atton asked, now applying more mental effort than necessary to keep his elbows to himself on the counter.

“It turned out to be more than just a feeling.” Eden continued, her gaze dropping to her lap, “I followed what you spacers call your ‘gut’ and got a front row seat to a massacre to show for it.”

Atton remained silent, stunned and unsure of what to say. A joke seemed inappropriate and he wasn’t exactly a paragon of empathy. Instead, he remained quiet but tried to look intent. Not to say that he wasn’t, but he made more of an effort to look more innocent about it, more earnest. Eden’s eyes, still full of miniature galaxies, glanced at him, registering his interest and continued, “I heard of a job -- an _expedition_ if you will -- to recover disposed equipment, parts and what-have-you from the site of an early skirmish before the war. I went to Tatooine to avoid all that but, I don’t know,” she said, sounding pained by the very retelling, “I couldn’t let it sit. I had to _see_ , I had to see what this whole ‘gut feeling’ was about.”

Eden took a deep breath, her fingers rapping on the bar in rapid succession now.

“The team I was with found what they were looking for, tons of abandoned tech, unused ammo, spare parts, all that’s good as gold on Tatooine… but there was something else.”

She was silent for a moment, her eyes staring straight ahead but Atton knew she wasn’t seeing the crowd or taking in any of what was actually happening before her and was instead replaying a memory, watching it unfold in her mind’s eye. Tempted, Atton found his own mind drifting from imaginary power couplings but managed to keep his thoughts to himself.

“I think it’s the reason Revan was ever there in the first place,” she started darkly, her eyes now meeting Atton’s, despondent and troubled, “Deep in the ruins was an ancient, _ancient_ Sith altar, and I mean prehistoric. Not like the stuff you see on Korriban, all intricate and lavish. This thing was crude, almost humble. Simple, yet… foreboding, buried deep beneath the site as if it had grown there like a natural cave, never meant to be found but to merely… _exist_.”

Her eyes trailed off as her words did, a recalled image undoubtedly playing in her mind as she described it and Atton suddenly realized that no muscle in his body was moving. His fingers lay dormant on his empty glass; his arm lay still on the bar in front of him.

“Anyway,” she broke herself out of her reverie, glancing at Atton before continuing, “On the altar was a pyramidal crystal. Three sided, and it was this deep orange-brown, like topaz or something. It caught the light, like, like it was _meant_ to, as if it were made by the first sun of the universe to capture its rays. I’ve never seen anything like it. But it was so-”

Without thinking, Atton finished, “ _Dark_?”

Eden looked at him, dumbstruck. “Exactly.” Her eyes flicked over him, uncertain and Atton panicked inside – but something made her stop questioning and continue her story. A question for a later time, perhaps.

“It was a holocron, an ancient Sith holocron. Older than any known Sith, any known Jedi … or so I _felt_ , anyway. I had never come across anything like it in my studies, or – it had some of the characteristics, it was – _ah_ , I won’t bore you with the details but,” Eden swallowed her words, her eyes focusing on some indistinct point in the distance again, biting her lip with unease, “Without the Force I can’t tell how accurate these ‘gut feelings’ were, but that was my impression.”

“But, what happened?”

Atton found himself rapt at attention, now leaning intently in Eden’s direction. He was careful not to rub elbows despite how much his body craved her closeness.

“Even though I didn’t have the Force to properly handle it, I knew it was some sort of dark artifact. The leader of the expedition, this aged veteran, the bitter kind, started getting quiet, and then we heard him… _sobbing_. Quietly, as if he didn’t know we were there. But soon the others started feeling it too. This woman who was some tech appraiser, began sabotaging the team’s equipment without any explanation until her eyes glazed over and she short circuited the group’s tracker, killing herself. The veteran started talking as if he was still in battle, only more like he was reliving a nightmare he had relived too often since the war, and walked straight off a ledge and into a chasm. We still heard him muttering even after he fell…”

“The others?” Atton was leaning even further now, and despite the mass of movement behind them he was so close he could take in Eden’s scent, or the smell of the common clothes the TSF had given her, anyway.

“The woman who told me about the job began talking to me as if I was her son. He died, I gathered, some years before. I don’t know how long ago it happened or how old he was, but she kept asking me if I had fun with ‘the kids in the square’ and that she would get me a gizka like I’d always asked. Something tells me she never did get that gizka and it kills her.”  

Eden swung back around to the counter and raised her hand for another round. The Twi’lek nodded solemnly, as if he knew what she spoke of even though he had been occupied at the other end of the bar.

“I played along with her and was able to get her out. I wrapped the holocron in a rough spun and tucked it into my pack, and to this day I still can’t figure out why it had no effect on me, but… I knew it couldn’t stay there. I found out later that many other expeditions had perished at the site. None had ever returned. And yet the rumors never tell of that part.”

“Then how did you come by this?”

Eden laughed bitterly, “A passing caravan of Jawa. I tried selling them the thing. I thought they wouldn’t know what it was. Awful, right?”

She laughed again, but Atton could tell she was not at all amused.

“They knew exactly what it was, but they couldn’t explain it. They just said it was something that they had known to avoid for centuries, millennia even, but that was as far as their lore went. I don’t think they actually _know_ what it is, just that the nature of its energy is… _bad_.”

“You don’t still have it with you, do you?”

“ _No_ , of course not, but I had it with me on the Harbinger. When the Republic first came for me, I thought that’s what they wanted. But as it turns out, they wanted me for some other mysterious reason I’m afraid I’ll never figure out at this point.” She laughed again, though still not entirely amused, “I brought it along figuring _someone_ might have a better idea. Guess that’s out of the question now.”

“You don’t think…?” Atton began, though he couldn’t bring himself to finish his sentence, mostly because he was _really_ beginning to feel the alcohol affect his motor skills and his lips felt nonexistent as he spoke, not because he had any flare for dramatics.

“I thought that, at first.” Eden finished for him, reading his nearing incoherent thoughts, “The moment I saw that hulking grey mass of scar tissue I thought he may have taken it. I checked my quarters on the Harbinger alone, remember? It’s not like I actually had any belongings, save for that damn thing. I had a feeling it wouldn’t be there, but I had to make sure. The Force tells me it will show up again, that’s it’s somehow connected to all of this, whatever _this_ is, but I can feel that Sion doesn’t have it.”

“That would be _Darth_ Sion, I believe,” Atton corrected, finding it within him to begin cracking jokes again.

The corner of Eden’s mouth shot upward into a smirk, “ _Right_ , where are my manners?”

“You Jedi have an awful lot of ominous feelings, don’t you?” Atton found himself saying, his fingertip tracing the rim of his empty cup.

He felt Eden’s eyes on him, narrowed, as she bit back a reminder that she was _no longer a Jedi_ , and despite her annoyance with him he still found it somewhat amusing to bring it up.

“What will it take to change your mind about that tired joke of yours?” she asked.

“Maybe a few more of these, or – on second thought, maybe not,” Atton’s stomach turned as he spoke.

“That’s pretty big of you,” she said, her eyes flashing some sort of pride as she waved down the barkeep again.

The bartender returned, but this time he collected the undrunk cups he had brought earlier, conjuring twin glasses of water in their place. Eden slid it towards Atton along the bar.

“Much obliged,” he lifted his glass. Eden did not honor the toast and rolled her eyes as she drank from her cup instead.

“Y’know, there’s another part to the story I haven’t told you yet,” she said, her eyes growing wicked as she laid her drink on the counter with delicate fingers. Atton’s skin was suddenly plagued with goosebumps, finding some inner part of him far more pleased with the display than he might have liked to let on.

“Oh?” he coughed purposefully, sounding none too graceful.

“In two parts,” Eden began, holding up two fingers with her free hand, “One being that little drink we shared is popular with mercenary crews who are working with new recruits. You see, they like to get their initiates roaringly drunk and ask them telling questions or shoot offensive comments at them to see how they react: do they throw punches or insults? Do they screw around at cards or become savants? And second being that, I’m not sure if you’re aware but _Jedi,_ as you so lovingly call me, are trained from a young age to resist poisons,”

“Alcohol being one of them,” Atton finished for her before his mouth set itself into a firm line. _How easily one forgets such things when they are not in use_ , but despite his embarrassment Atton could never imagine trying to kill or turn Eden as he had other countless Jedi. He imagined what she might have looked like eight years ago: younger, smaller, perhaps more tenacious than she was now, and yet regardless of his conjecture he knew that no matter what he would not have managed it. Maybe that was the drink talking, or his lower bits, but Jedi weren’t the only ones who had _feelings_ apparently… “Very clever.”

“Mhm,” she hummed into a coy smile, taking another sip of water.

“So, are Jedi entirely incapable of becoming inebriated?”

“Oh, not _entirely_. It might take a bit more work than say, _you_ for instance.”

 _Very funny_. Atton could only laugh at himself. Despite his relative coherence, he could not conjure his couplings, his prize Pazaak hand… and instead he could only let Eden watch him, entirely too pleased with herself and so unlike any other Jedi he had ever met.

“You know,” he began, hardly sure of where he was going when his mouth began to act of its own accord, “I don’t know what it is, but you look different.”

Eden paused, placing her cup on the counter before turning her full attention towards him. Her eyes glowed – half green, half blue in the light – beneath knotted brows that were very clearly unsure of what in the ‘verse he was going on about.

“ _What?”_ she asked through an uncertain laugh, amused despite her confusion.

Atton shook his head. She knew he was not one for words right now, given the state she knowingly put him in, but his mind tried anyway.

“It’s hard to explain, but it’s, uh, it’s good to see _,”_ a smile crept over his face, though he only knew it was there since he couldn’t quite feel his facial muscles working quite as well. Not even a handful of drinks down and he was already a fool. _Always the fool… always the fool._

Eden shifted in her seat, whether out of discomfort or confused curiosity, Atton wasn’t sure.

“It’s like… you’ve got this glow, but only when I see you out of the corner of my eye. On Peragus, you seemed… well, a little less at peace with yourself. Now you’re different.”

Her cheeks flushed. Eden’s eyes cast downward for a moment before meeting him again with bashful uncertainty. And there it was again, that plaguing sense of pleasurable anxiousness, the kind he felt when Eden was inclined to laugh at his remarks or let him shoot something without asking questions first. _Shit, what am I saying?!_ But it was all too late. In a final effort, his mind searched its records for that prize Pazaak game, for the memorized tick of an engine running to keep his mind occupied, but instead all he could think of was Eden and just how much of a pleasure she was to be around. _A pleasure?!_ He berated his inner vocabulary as he thought to himself, though he could not find a point to argue.

“’At peace’, _really_? After that scene I had with that old witch back at the apartment?” Eden laughed bitterly, this time waving the barkeep down again and summoning another drink. He wasn’t sure what she was doing, working the Force perhaps, but without words she was able to order without actually speaking to the man. If more Jedi used their powers for this sort of luxury, Atton was no longer sure he would have spent so much time trying to kill them.

“ _Especially_ after that scene with the old witch back there,” Atton affirmed, mirroring her words, happy to hear Eden take to his affectionate moniker for the ancient woman. “Kreia may be some wise and powerful being from a bygone era, but you don’t have to let her control your every move just because she’s as old as the galaxy. And that’s exactly what you told her. That’s… _admirable_.”

Despite his inability to put up a wall, some distraction to keep warmer thoughts of Eden from his mind, Atton’s fingers took to tapping on his empty glass again. Out of habit, he felt his hands itch to ask for another strong drink before thinking better of it. Eden watched him, apprehensive.

“I admit, her wisdom is surprising for the most part, but she does tend to micromanage everything, and that just-“ Eden inhaled, keeping herself from slipping into a string of expletives. She brought her cup to her lips and drank deeply instead.

“I’m glad _someone_ approves of what I’ve been doing,” she finished. Atton observed as her slim fingers took to tapping her glass as well. Their fingers drummed, though mute against the thrumming music behind them, and Atton felt some deeper connection he could not quite explain but found himself trying _very_ hard in the face of his drunkenness not to voice.

“That’s the thing though,” he said, leaning in this time. _This_ was of his own doing, though he knew he shouldn’t, for his own sake. Though unlike any other alcohol he had ever consumed, it rid him of any inner filter, any small voices in his head that may have otherwise told him _stop before this gets too serious_ but some part of him knew that it was already too late. He liked her too much already, and there was no distraction capable enough in his mind to stop him from realizing that now. “You don’t _need_ anyone to approve anything.”

Atton remained close to her, waiting for her reaction. His body felt detached though somehow still a part of him, at least enough to feel the creeping anxiety of being this close to Eden again even though they weren’t touching. She did not back away and met his gaze instead, matching him. Despite his blood’s decision to begin beating hard beneath his skin at the sight of her, he stayed there, relishing in her glow as she soaked in his words and felt them in full.

After a moment, she smiled, though with genuine sentiment this time. Her eyes looked away, retreating to her drink now resting on the bar.

“Y’know,” she started, biting her lip before continuing, “I didn’t expect this from you.”

"Was that your idea of getting me riled up?"

"Hah,  _no_ ," Eden laughed, "Though I can think of a few ways to manage that without any help. I was just..." Eden's eyes searched the bar, as if expecting to find the words she was struggling to say hidden somewhere in the bartender's bottles, "I was testing your character."

She stressed every syllable, as if she were trying to convince herself just as much as Atton.

“You sound disappointed…”

“No, I’m just…” Eden laughed again, nervously, _she does that a lot_. “ _Surprised_ , that’s all.”

“Surprised, huh?” Atton leaned back. Feeling began to creep into his limbs again, the adrenaline of being close to Eden seemingly having reinvigorated him, granting him a bit more control over himself than a moment before. Atton was, in fact, full of surprises, though perhaps not the kind Eden was keen on discovering…

“About that…” he drawled, the bartender nudging a new, full glass of water into his palm, as if Twi’lek just knew. _It’s either a Jedi mind trick or the man is the most attuned bartender in the galaxy._

“Like I said, ‘ _punches or insults’ –_ and you chose…”

 “Flattery?” he proposed just before the realization of her words sunk in, “Wait, _wait_ – you were testing me?!” Atton snickered, though he could only blame himself.

“I expected flattery from you, flyboy, but _that_ was too… too-“

“Too _what_?”

Eden bit her lip, and swallowed whatever words lingered on the tip of her tongue. Atton was not the only one feeling reluctant to share. “It doesn’t matter. If I wanted to glean any useful information, I would have brought Kreia along instead.”

“Yeah, I imagine that would have gone over well,” Atton laughed, half-imagining the scenario, but his mind was still incapable of doing his bidding.

“I know right? I mean, I figured it might be interesting to bring you along, but it’s not like you’re not splitting the first chance you get, and I don’t blame you. No hard feelings, right?”

Atton shook his head, but knew Eden was perhaps left with more hard feelings than she may have intended. Perhaps she had meant to blow off steam, play around with some sorry scum of the universe like him to relieve whatever mounting stress that old fossil instilled in her whenever she opened her ancient mouth… or perhaps Eden had honestly forgotten that Atton was going to leave, that he never signed on for this and perhaps intended to leave them both behind without a second glance.

Well, she was right, but there was something about that fact that no longer felt so certain to Atton anymore.

Eden slowly spun on her barstool, facing the dancefloor as the kaleidoscope lights took to her eyes again, a dark expression possessing her features.

Atton found his mouth about to protest as her words settled in his stomach, steeping into his bones as he felt the weight of them, but his lips remained dormant, silent. She was right, but why didn’t he feel so sure anymore?

“What say we play a game of Pazaak, shall we? Let’s see how you fare with the second part of the mercenary’s bargain,” she said suddenly as a look of mischief attempted to bewitch her features as she dropped the previous subject entirely.

“ _Now_ we’re talking,” Atton replied, thankful for this new form of familiarity, for the _distraction_.

Relief swept over him, but Atton somehow still felt heavy. Something a lot like guilt wracked his bones as he imagined Eden at Kreia’s side, alone, and despite how unattractive the idea of spending any more time with that bitter old woman was, there was still something so enticing about the Exile. Whether it was the pure draw of the unexpected, the lure of danger that seemed to follow her at every turn, or other more base desires his conscious mind still tried to suppress when in her presence, there was something about her he could not reconcile with himself and it all made him uneasy.

Atton may have been used to bad feelings, but this was something else entirely.

 

**Author's Note:**

> My feelings for Atton/Exile will most likely eat away at me like a black hole nibbling at the edges of my soul. I had written out several scenes for a novel length fic attempting to reconcile the lofty plot of TSL and the unsatisfying Revan novelization, and though I am still contemplating posting that fic in full I decided I would post this scene first. In a way, it is a companion piece to "Aftermath" though clearly takes place way earlier in the game and gives far more insight into the relationship I had head cannoned for these two as well as a little more characterization on my idea of the Exile. If anyone *is* interested in the full fic, I may still post it, but if not I may just post some choice Atton/Exile scenes in an attempt to breathe some life into this corner of AO3.
> 
> UPDATE: This is now part of my Dark Wars series. You can find the first installment, "Out of the Abyss" under The Dark Wars project. I changed the story regarding the holocrons, which can be found in the chapter titled "What Lies Beneath". I may update this fic to reflect that but I might also change the scene as it appears in the full fic when I get up to that point and leave this one as it is. A special thanks again to those who've read and left kudos so far though! :)


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